Protesting against a bouquet of issues in West Bengal including corruption, communalism, price rise and attack on women, 18 Left Front organisations on Wednesday organised a march to city police headquarters at Lalbazar but were stopped midway by police.

A six-member delegation of the Left Front leaders later went inside, where they submitted the deputation to a senior city officer as the city Police Commissioner was not available.

Lalbazar, situated at central Kolkata, was turned into a fortress with police personnel deployed both at the in and out gates to avoid any untoward incidents.

Police set up two barricades on the nearby Ganesh Chandra Avenue crossing and placed water cannons to stop the rally.

Several senior officers and Rapid Action Force personnel were also deployed to keep a tab of the situation.

However, no police action was needed as the rally led by the Left Front Chairman Biman Bose and CPI-M State Secretary Surjya Kanta Misra neither made any attempts to break barricades nor resorted to any form of violence that was witnessed during the Front's march to state secretariat rally in May.

"Today we rallied in protest of the growing unemployment, corruption and communal hostility in West Bengal. We also demanded the arrest of the corrupt party leaders of the state ruling party who are convicts in Narada and Saradha scams," CPI-M leader Rabin Deb told IANS.

"Our delegation led by Niranjan Chatterjee, convener of Left Front Kollata district went to meet Police Commissioner Rajib Kumar but but he was not available. We had to give deputation to Additional Commissioner of Police Supratim Sarkar," he said.

Deb also alleged that several of their activists are being heckled in false cases and the democratic environment in the state is getting disrupted.

"We demand the release of hundreds of left activists who are suffering in jail in false cases," he said.

Deb said a meeting of all the left parties would be called after the Durga Puja and a political gathering would be organised on November 3.

--IANS

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